Apparatus with a raised grip for exercising wrist and forearm muscles

ABSTRACT

An apparatus for exercising wrist and forearm muscles includes a hollow body, a resistance assembly, a pivot bracket and a grip assembly. The resistance assembly is mounted on the body to provide a resistance. The pivot bracket is pivotally mounted in the body and connects to the resistance assembly. The grip assembly is mounted in the pivot bracket between the arms and has a shaft mounted on the pivot bracket and a raised grip rotatably mounted on the shaft. The raised grip could be of a baseball configuration, a football configuration and so on to provide a large effective surface for gripping. Therefore, the raised grip is convenient and comfortable to grip while exercising wrist and forearm muscles.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

1. Field of the Invention

The present invention relates to an apparatus for exercising wrist andforearm muscles, and more particularly to an apparatus for exercisingwrist and forearm muscles having a raised grip that is convenient tohold for a user.

2. Description of Related Art

With reference to FIG. 5, an apparatus for exercising wrist and forearmmuscles in accordance with the prior art comprises a grip assembly (60)and a spring-loaded resistance assembly (62). The grip assembly (60)comprises a hollow body (61), a pivot bracket (63), a cylindrical grip(64) and a shaft (65). The pivot bracket (63) is pivotally mounted inthe body (61). The shaft (65) is mounted on the pivot bracket (63). Thegrip (64) is mounted rotatably on the shaft (65) so that a person canhold the grip (64) to exercise the wrist and forearm muscles.

The resistance assembly (62) is mounted on the body (61) and comprises acord (621), a resistance spring (622), a plug (623) and a tube (624).The tube (624) is mounted on the body (61). The resistance spring (622)is mounted in the tube (624). The cord (621) has a proximal end (notnumbered) and a distal end (not numbered). The distal end of the cord(621) connects to the plug (623) which is mounted in the tube (624) toabut the resistance spring (622). The proximal end of the cord (621)passed through the resistance spring (622) and connects to the pivotbracket (63).

Therefore, when the pivot bracket (63) is pivoted by a user's hand, themovement of the pivot bracket (63) will pull the plug (623) through thecord (621) to compress the resistance spring (622) to create a springforce as a resistant force against the hand for exercising muscles.

However, because the grip (64) is cylindrical, it provides only arestricted effective surface for gripping. Furthermore the grip (64) isuncomfortable and inconvenient to hold for the user when using theapparatus to exercise the wrist and forearm muscles because of itsrestricted surface.

To overcome the shortcomings, the present invention provides anapparatus with an improved grip for exercising the wrist and forearmmuscles to mitigate or obviate the aforementioned problems.

SUMMARY OF THF INVENTION

The main objective of the invention is to provide an apparatus forexercising the wrist and forearm muscles that has a raised grip toenhance a gripping effect, and the raised grip can be formed as a ballshape for simulation in training for throwing a ball.

Other objectives, advantages and novel features of the invention willbecome more apparent from the following detailed description when takenin conjunction with the accompanying drawings.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is a perspective view of an apparatus with a raised grip forexercising wrist and forearm muscles in accordance with the preventinvention;

FIG. 2 is an exploded perspective view of the apparatus in FIG. 1;

FIG. 3 is an operational perspective view of the apparatus in FIG. 1;

FIG. 4 is a perspective view of an alternative embodiment of theapparatus in FIG. 1; and

FIG. 5 is an exploded perspective view of an apparatus for exercisingwrist and forearm muscles in accordance with the prior art.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF PREFERRED EMBODIMENT

With reference to FIGS. 1 and 2, an apparatus for exercising wrist andforearm muscles in accordance with the present invention comprises abody (30), a grip assembly (10), a pivot bracket (40) and a resistanceassembly (50) as previously described in prior art. The body (30) ishollow and has a curved upper portion (31), a curved lower portion (32)and a passage (33). The curved upper and lower portions (31, 32) areintegrated together to form the passage (33).

The resistance assembly (50) is mounted on the curved upper portion (31)of the body (30) to provide a resistance to exercise wrist and forearmmuscles as previously described. The pivot bracket (40) is pivotallymounted in the body (30) and connects to the resistance assembly (50).The pivot bracket (40) has two arms (41). Each arm (41) has multipleadjusting holes (42) that are arranged in a row. The rows of theadjusting holes (42) in the arms (41) are aligned with each other.

The grip assembly (10) is mounted in the pivot bracket (40) between thearms (41) and comprises two inner tubes (11), a raised grip (12), twosleeves (15), a shaft (16) and two fasteners (17). The raised grip (12)has a baseball shape, is rotatably mounted on the shaft (16) and has aninner passage (121) with two opposite openings (not numbered). The innertubes (11) are respectively attached into the openings in the raisedgrip (12) and are aligned with inner passage (121). The sleeves (15) arerespectively mounted on the inner tubes (11).

The shaft (16) passes though the inner tubes (11) and is held in theinner tubes (11) and the inner passage (121). The shaft (16) has twoends (not numbered) and each end of the shaft (16) has a screw hole(161) corresponding to the adjusting holes (42). The shaft (16) ismounted between the arms (41) and corresponds to a pair of the adjustingholes (42) in the two arms (41).

The fasteners (17) screw respectively into the screw holes (161) in theshaft (16) to fasten the shaft (16) with the arms (41). Each fastener(17) has a threaded shaft (not numbered) and a tuning knob (notnumbered). The threaded shaft has an inside end (not numbered) and anoutside end (not numbered). The tuning knob is attached to the outsideend. The inside end of the threaded shaft passes through one adjustinghole (42) and screws into the screw hole (161) in the shaft (16) tofasten the shaft (16).

With reference to FIGS. 1 and 3, since the raised grip (12) has abaseball configuration, a user's hand passes through the passage (33)and holds the raised grip (12) with certain fingers, such as thumb,index finger and middle finger. The apparatus provides a simulator forthe user to practice throwing a ball as needed in a pitcher's skills andexercise simultaneously the muscles. Because the raised grip (12) isspherical, the raised grip (12) has a bigger outer periphery incomparison with the cylindrical grip as found in prior art and thus theuser will effectively hold the raised grip (12) for simulation intraining for throwing the baseball when exercising wrist and forearmmuscles.

With reference to FIG. 4, an alternative embodiment of the presentinvention is to modify the baseball-shaped raised grip (12) to afootball configuration (13) and apply another type of resistanceassembly (52). The football configuration (13) has an outer surface (notnumbered) and multiple recesses (131) defined in the outer surface. Therugged outer surface of the football configuration (13) provides anefficient effect of gripping to prevent the user's hand from slippingout of the football configuration (13) when held by the user.

Consequently, the raised grip (12) could be a baseball configuration orfootball configuration (13) that provide an increased surface for a userto hold the raised grip (12) conveniently and comfortably. Also, theuser can hold the raised grip (12) to be more effective while exercisingthe wrist and forearm muscles.

Even though numerous characteristics and advantages of the presentinvention have been set forth in the foregoing description, togetherwith details of the structure and function of the invention, thedisclosure is illustrative only, and changes may be made in detail,especially in matters of shape, size, and arrangement of parts withinthe scope of the appended claims.

1. An apparatus for exercising wrist and forearm muscles and theapparatus comprising: a hollow body having a curved upper portion and acurved lower portion that are integrated together to form a passage; aresistance assembly mounted on the curved upper portion of the body toprovide a resistance to exercise wrist and forearm muscles; a pivotbracket pivotally mounted in the body, connecting to the resistanceassembly and having two arms; and a grip assembly mounted in the pivotbracket between the arms and comprising a shaft mounted on between thearms and having two ends; and a raised grip rotatably mounted on theshaft and having an inner passage with two openings to receive theshaft.
 2. The apparatus for exercising wrist and forearm muscles asclaimed in claim 1, wherein the raised grip has a baseballconfiguration.
 3. The apparatus for exercising wrist and forearm musclesas claimed in claim 1, wherein the raised grip has a footballconfiguration, an outer periphery and multiple recesses defined in theouter periphery.
 4. The apparatus for exercising wrist and forearmmuscles as claimed in claim 2 further comprising two inner tubes mountedrotatably on the shaft, and attached respectively to the openings of theraised grip and aligned with inner passage; and two sleeves respectivelymounted on the inner tubes.
 5. The apparatus for exercising wrist andforearm muscles as claimed in claim 3 further comprising two inner tubesmounted rotatably on the shaft, and attached respectively to theopenings of the raised grip and aligned with inner passage; and twosleeves respectively mounted on the inner tubes.
 6. The apparatus forexercising wrist and forearm muscles as claimed in claim 5, wherein eacharm has multiple adjusting holes arranged in a row, each end of theshaft has a screw hole corresponding to one row of the adjusting holesand the grip assembly further comprises two fasteners screwingrespectively into the screw holes in the shaft, each fastener having athreaded shaft and a tuning knob, the threaded shaft having an insideend and an outside end, the tuning knob attached to the outside end, theinside end of the threaded shaft passing through one of the adjustingholes and screwing into the corresponding screw hole in the shaft.